


Honor

by yuletide_archivist



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-20
Updated: 2006-12-20
Packaged: 2018-01-25 08:02:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1640321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for Nokomis</p>
    </blockquote>





	Honor

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Nokomis

 

 

Cersei was drunk again; Jaime knew that even before the harried servant pounded on his door. He knew it at the evening's feast when she lifted her golden cup to her lips far more than her fork. He could take that, could take a giddy Cersei laughing with Lady Taena, teasing him as he wobbled his goblet with his gold hand, he could take that but when she made a toast to Aurane Waters, "for the successfully reviving Westeros' trade routes to the east!" She said but her eyes, the gleaming cold emerald spoke "for fucking me", Tyrion's voice laughed in his mind... _she's been fucking Lancel and Osmund Kettleback and Moon Boy for all I know_...She smiled and Jaime knocked the goblet, Arbor gold splashing on a bewildered Harys Swyft, Cersei only laughed, "Grace, my brother, when did it leave you!" _Gatehouse, my dear sister, when did you raise your levers for anything with legs?_ He thought in his fury and rose to leave the table, Cersei's laughter following him down to his chambers.

"The Queen..." The girl shook at the sight of him. She stared at his stump, seemingly unable to move. Jaime was tempted to slap the insolence out of her, but his glare was enough to put life back into her transfixed form. She lowered her eyes hastily, and murmured, "The Queen sends for you, Ser Jaime." She scampered out into the darkness and Jaime took a torch, lighting his way down the shadowy tower to see Cersei alone.

"Jaime," she crooned with a stifling smile as he opened the door after hanging the torch on the hallway wall. "My dear sweet brother has finally returned to where he belongs, right by my side." Cersei pushed herself off her great red bed. She wore nothing but two gold bands lined with rubies on her wrists and an elaborate necklace made up of a web of gold and rubies that dangled between her breasts, the fireplace in her room tracing shadows and creating golden light on her milky skin. She sauntered over to him and placed her arms around his neck, "Jaime," she whispered and traced her hand from his neck to his stomach to his- he stopped it, holding it in place. "Jaime," Cersei laughed, "why hold back, dear brother?" She didn't wait for a response, but instead kissed his neck.

"Cersei," he said quietly at first but she continued, making her way up his neck. He felt him drop her hand and she proceeded to finish her work with glad eagerness but when she finally placed her lips on his, Tyrion spoke once more: ... _she's been fucking Lancel and Osmund Kettleback and Moon Boy for all I know_... "Cersei." He said sternly, she continued. "Cersei! Away!" Probably been fucking Moon Boy... It was completely a command and full of all his fury; he ripped her hand from his pants and pushed her back, she stumbling farther back in her stupor.

She lifted her head slowly. "What are you doing, Jaime."

"That is a question you should be asking yourself, dear Cersei." He adjusted his pants.

"Serving my brother." She walked towards him. "Though lately my brother does not seem to need me. He pushes away my every advance when he knows he is the only one who can complete me." Her arms were once more wrapped around his neck, "Come now, sweet Jaime, finally come to your dear sweet sister.

_She's been fucking Lancel and Osmund Kettleback and Moon Boy for all I know._

He shoved her away so hard she fell back onto the marble floor, the gold of her bracelets clanking against it. She glowered at him the emerald of her eyes burning in vehemence and then stood up silently. She approached him once more, no longer sultry or tempting, the glow of the alcohol fading from her veins in the wake of Jaime's shove. "I am the Queen. How can you deny a Queen!"

"You are a child." He said flatly.

She slapped him then. "Out!" She commanded. "Out and out, out, get out!" She stormed to the door, holding it open for him.

He remained stony, the sting of her slap still burning on his face and with but a curt nod, left, walking down from the tower into the cold of the night till he could feel it no more, cursing her all the same.

Finding himself outside of the armory of the castle, Jaime went into it and pulled one of the gleaming Valyrian steel blades from the sheath on the wall, ignoring his left hand's confusion of the weight it now held. Once out in the night again, he set up one of the straw and burlap men the squires used for target practice in jousting training. The straw men had two buttons for eyes and sewn on smiles that the squire-masters insisted increased the young boys' focus. Picking up the sword uneasily, its weight foreign to his left hand, he swung half-hazardly at the straw man, missing it more often than hitting it. He spun around, swinging at it again only to have the weight of his sword bring his hand down into nothing. Brienne's bear was easier than this motionless sack of shit. He kicked it, the force of the strike bringing the straw man down. The stupid grin and button eyes stared up at Jaime and Jaime stepped on the man's face again and again until it was no more.

The man no more than burlap and straw blowing in the wind, Jaime dropped the sword watching the white straw being swept up in the coming winter winds into the starry sky. The constellation of the Fool grinned down at him but Jaime consoled himself with the fact that above the Fool stood the Bear tall and raging. The Fool could grin no more with its head in the Bear's mouth.

The Bear. He glanced down at the fallen sword and thought of her once more, her broad freckled face once nothing but to mock but now, something to dream of. Brienne, the Maid of Tarth: she dropped the joke tourney sword, standing behind him as his hand shook with the heavy sword, swinging it in desperation at the oncoming bear. Nothing was there for him but Brienne at that moment, the towering walls of Harrnehal disappeared once he jumped into the ring, the burning sting of his lost hand and the bellowing laughter of the crowd, nothing but Brienne to protect, to save. And it was then with his poor hand and the Maid of Tarth behind him that in all his life that he fought the hardest.

The bear fell.

But when she looked at him, her eyes wide and bright, glimmering blue and in a whisper thanked him, Jaime could not bring himself to look at her. He only stared at the tears in the ridiculous pink dress they shoved Brienne into, counting their numbers, noting there should be far less of them. He turned away.

"Jaime," She had said a good deal later as they traveled to King's Landing. She taken to calling him by his true name not the mocking insults that the Stark woman had installed in her but his true name. They set up camp for a night under two grand oak trees and Jaime returned from the nearby creek, a line of fish in his hand. It was easier to fish with one hand than build a fire. He looked down at her, at her standing height she was as tall as him, a grand tower of a woman but sitting down she almost looked diminutive. Hell, maybe it was the dark or the delirium his wound sometimes brought upon him. He sat down next to her and put a fish in his mouth so he could shove it through with a stick.

"Jaime," She rolled her eyes and took the fish from him sticking it for him but she did not give it back to him. She cooked it over the fire herself.

He snickered, leaning back against the tree. "So the Lady Knight of Tarth is a cook now? Looks like she finally understands that underneath her armor isn't a dick."

She ignored it and he suddenly felt foolish and looked away from her. She placed the stick, the fish now roasted and brown, in his hand. "I wanted to thank you."

"For making you realize you didn't have a dick?"

She looked at him. "For the bear, for, you know..." She met his eyes then, blue meeting green. "Saving me."

Jaime just shrugged, taking another bite of the fish and looked at the blazing fire. He then threw the stick down on the ground, only to find another one in his hand...and the Maid of Tarth's hand.

He should have let go, this hand was no Cersei's, not smooth and white as milk but callous and hardened with time and battle like his own. He meant her eyes, her eyes, her eyes were different from Cersei's as well, not a hollowing icy green but living, trusting, blue as the Sea of Dorne. Jaime felt himself spinning suddenly but not from the handless-induced delirium not from thoughts of Cersei naked and willing but from her, Brienne, a woman who knew far more about swords than she did about lips. "I wanted to thank you..." She said again and suddenly he found himself a willing teacher under those oak trees. He touched her face, the stars glimmering in the blue of her eyes, she suddenly looking ever bit a beauty in this unknown state to Jaime.

"I know," He said and then he placed his lips upon her.

Brienne thanked him.

He remembered after, looking at the fire, seeing his sister's face in it. Brienne laid sleeping under the tree, looking every bit a lady curled up and breathing softy instead of the knight she really used. He touched his lip and felt regret and confusion, lowering his head to the fire. Jaime would make it up to Cersei once he returned; he would give her everything she needed and more. Long ago under the glimmering crystal lights of the Sept, he devoted himself in word to the Kingsguard but in heart to Cersei. _Cersei Cersei Cersei_ , he drank her name and forgot. Cersei, the fire burned in his heart but when he woke Brienne up for her watch, met her eyes once more, Cersei was nothing more but the whistling wind. He laid down with his back to the Maid of Tarth, trying to dream of his great return to King's Landing but only dreamt of her.

But now, Jaime regretted that, he should have stood up, gone back to the fire and kissed her once more, kissed her again and again and more, honor was nothing, this, this was everything. But everything, everything was everyone else to Cersei as she kissed and kissed and did more, far much more to everyone. The devotion in the womb that Cersei swore on faded with every man she touched. Jaime stared down at the sword, glimmering in the light of the moon but he did not pick it up.

Jaime walked into the woods, away from Red Keep and into the coming winter.

 

 

 


End file.
